Sale #1

Well, my first Clarion story, “Tending the Mori Birds” was rejected at Clarkesworld, but I turned it around for a quick sale to Fantasy Magazine! It’s my very first sale, so of course I spent much of this past weekend celebrating (having heard on Friday that the story was accepted). And, as proof that I didn’t hallucinate the whole thing: http://oldcharliebrown.livejournal.com/87419.html.

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Too jumpy for my own good….

(Or, “Why I shouldn’t drink a bunch of coffee and then sit at home by myself writing stories about corpses during a rainstorm”)

I’m up to 3,300 words on my corpse photography story, which is probably a bit past the halfway mark. I was making excellent progress on it this morning until a gust of wind blew pounding rain into my window right as a dead woman was sneaking up behind one of my characters. Let’s just say I’m a bit jumpy today, and leave it at that. I did manage not to spill my coffee (mainly due to the …

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Brrr!

Frosted Yellow Leaves

Woke up this morning and noticed that the hummingbird feeder on the porch was frozen solid. I think it got down to 20 degrees last night. Of course, my first thought this morning was – excellent, I’ll go out and take pictures of frosty autumn leaves! Which I did. I think my hands are frozen since I stubbornly refuse to wear gloves while taking pictures (makes the camera harder to handle).

But now I’m back inside with a hot cup of coffee, feeling much warmer and quite …

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Flickr Addictd

I’m officially a Flickr junkie–I caved and payed for a full-featured account. The ever-so-smart people who designed the site rate the photos on a random mishmash of things (how many times it’s been viewed, comments, who calls it a favorite) to give it an ‘interestingness’ score. Competitive person that I am, I want my photos to get recognized as ‘interesting.’ So I spend way too much time finding groups in which to display said photos. That and I like to look at all the purdy pictures other people are posting. The whole thing is highly addictive. But it’s relatively harmless …

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Submission #12 and more new words

I’m eligible for Clarkesworld again (can’t submit for seven days after a reject), so I sent another one their way. I’m hoping that Nick will like bloody-throated birds better than giant spiders.

My not-so-alternate-history story continues to grow at a steady pace, I’m up to 3000 words now. This is the point at which it has fallen apart before, but I give myself permission to write the rest as complete crap if necessary, just to get it done. I’m also trying to resist the urge to start over and tweak the beginning–this is what got me into trouble the first …

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1300 words today

I’ve re-started my vaguely alternate history story about seven times now, but I’m finally optimistic that this one will take. I switched the POV from third person to first, which has gotten the words flowing, and I think I’ve shaped it such that it no longer involves much history (which, for me, is also a good thing). In any case, I’m determined to force the story through to the end no matter how badly this version sucks because, dammit, I want to finish something. Then I can inflict it on one of my many writing groups and they can tell …

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